Star-Gazer

Forty-two years ago (to me if to no one

The number is of some interest) it was a brilliant starry

And the westward train was empty and had no

So darting from side to side I could catch the unwonted

Of those almost intolerably

Holes, punched in the sky, which excited me partly

Of their Latin names and partly because I had read in the

How very far off they were, it seemed their

Had left them (some at least) long years before I was.

And this remembering now I mark that

Light was leaving some of them at least then,

Forty-two years ago, will never

In time for me to catch it, which light

It does get here may find that there is

Anyone left

To run from side to side in a late night

Admiring it and adding noughts in vain.